It is known to print a composite or interlaced image on a sheet of material and then overlay a transparent lenticular sheet in order to achieve one of several special visual effects. A composite image comprises a plurality of interlaced image slices, wherein the slices are portions of two or more different source images. A lenticular sheet includes a plurality of parallel semi-cylindrical lenses, or lenticules, and the image slices are aligned with the lenticules. Alternatively, a composite image can be printed directly on the backside of a transparent lenticular sheet.
The different special effects that can be obtained by viewing a composite image through the lenticular lenses include, for example, a three-dimensional effect, motion of an object, morphing between two different images, and flipping between distinct images. For example, a composite image can be created by interlacing slices of source images that are different perspective views of an object. Viewing such a composite image through a lenticular sheet creates a three dimensional effect due to the parallax shift between the images viewed by each eye. If a composite image is created by interlacing source images of an object at sequential points in time, viewing that image through a lenticular sheet conveys an impression of motion as the position of the viewer changes with respect to the lenticular sheet. Similarly, if a composite image is created by interlacing different source images of one or more faces, for example, viewing the composite image through a lenticular sheet creates a morphing effect as the position of the viewer changes with respect to the lenticular sheet. Similarly, a flip effect can occur by viewing a composite image that is created from dissimilar source images.